2010 Elaine Howie Rating Clubs

Juniors are capable of so much progress in chess! In recognition of their efforts, I have assigned outstanding players to "clubs". Each club is based on a certain amount of rating increase in both CFC and CMA in the year 2010. Even the "100 club" is a huge achievement, so keep up the good work!

Note: Clubs are not necessarily related to the EH Fund Award - see my previous post for the 12 finalists.

EH 100 club

Name	Increase in CFC Rating	Increase in CMA Rating
Jeremy Hui	+ 101	+ 517
Declan Paul Boushy	+ 106	+ 151
Zi Yi (Joey) Qin	+ 112	+ 149
Dan Liu	+ 125	+ 442
Michael Kleinman	+ 126	+ 282
Richard Chen	+ 133	+ 304
Janet Peng	+ 137	+ 291
Ross Cunningham	+ 140	+ 223
Jayson Huang	+ 232	+ 142
Constance Wang	+ 154	+ 207
Jackie Peng	+ 209	+ 158
Kevin Wan	+ 161	+ 217
Kajan Thanabalachandran	+ 164	+ 218
Theo Wolchock	+ 268	+ 165
Konstantin Semianiuk	+ 169	+ 2168 (new)
Zhiyuan Zhang	+ 173	+ 252
David Miller	+ 206	+ 176
Jiaxin Liu	+ 177	+ 192
Jeff Zhang	+ 247	+ 178
Terrence (Terry) Ju	+ 185	+ 208
David Itkin	+ 191	+ 416
Juliaan Posaratnanathan	+ 192	+ 232
Yue Tong (Davy) Zhao	+ 195	+ 228
Patrick Angelo Tolentino	+ 238	+ 195

EH 200 club

Name	Increase in CFC Rating	Increase in CMA Rating
Varshini Paraparan	+ 200	+ 376
Leslie Tang	+ 205	+ 295
Jamil F. Kassam	+ 301	+ 212
Dennis Tismenko	+ 241	+ 752
Shaumik Baki	+ 245	+ 365
Hong Rui Zhu	+ 257	+ 331
Ryan Yang	+ 266	+ 606
Yuanchen Zhang	+ 270	+ 270
Luke Pulfer	+ 295	+ 543

EH 300 club

Name	Increase in CFC Rating	Increase in CMA Rating
Joshua Doknjas	+ 309	+ 495
Michael Su	+ 316	+ 1230 (new)
Nicole Birarov	+ 368	+ 464
Lin (Xin) Song	+ 376	+ 422

EH 400 club

Name	Increase in CFC Rating	Increase in CMA Rating
Razvan Preotu	+ 589	+ 440
Mathanhe Kaneshalingam	+ 628	+ 441

EH 600 club

Name	Increase in CFC Rating	Increase in CMA Rating
Jason Cao	+ 689	+ 602

Elaine Howie Fund Top 12

Very difficult to narrow down, but here are the 12 finalists - congratulations, ONE of you will win the 2010 EH Fund award!

Yue Tong (Davy) Zhao
Luke Pulfer
Nicole Birarov
Patrick Angelo Tolentino
Varshini Paraparan
Jamil F. Kassam
Daniel Zotkin
Derick Aghamalian
Jeff Zhang
Razvan Preotu
Juliaan Posaratnanathan
Yuekai Wang

If your name is above, send me an email (checkmateupdate@gmail.com) for information on receiving a Top 12 certificate and prize.

If you know any of these juniors, please inform them of this achievement!

Main criteria used to judge:

- Must be a junior, under the age of 18
- Must be a member of both the CFC and CMA
- Must appear in the Top 50 list for their grade/age group in 2010
- Displays commitment through participation in a variety of tournaments in 2010; active tournaments count for participation; at-home matches do not count
- Substantial rating growth in both CFC (regular rating) and CMA in 2010
- General consistency - for instance, performance ratings generally higher than ratings entering tournaments
- Preference is given to those who achieved a score of 50% or more in a few large events (provincial, national, continental), particularly the CYCC
- Significant achievements/performances/training/teamwork are considered
- Rating progress for new players is judged based on their first rating, where available, rather than zero
- Factors such as province, gender, school, chess club, etc. are considered irrelevant in the selection process

Exclusions:

- Anyone affiliated with me or my blog, such as past students, co-instructors, and library volunteers, is excluded from receiving the monetary prize
- Anyone known to be receiving funding from another source (like CMA) is also excluded
- In future years, the fund cannot be claimed by the same recipient unless the fund structure changes significantly

More information to come...

Elaine Howie Fund Update

Hello Readers,

I found some time this weekend to sort through the numbers related to the 2010 fund. More details in the morning...

To give you an idea of juniors who have done exceptionally well in 2010 according to the criteria I have set out (I'll explain in the morning; the order below is simply by age category):

Theo Wolchock
Joshua Doknjas
Yue Tong (Davy) Zhao
Kevin Yi-Xiao Yie
Luke Pulfer
Nicole Birarov
Declan Paul Boushy
Patrick Angelo Tolentino
Varshini Paraparan
Joseph Bellissimo
Yuanchen Zhang
Jamil F. Kassam
Kevin Wan
Daniel Zotkin
Derick Aghamalian
Jeff Zhang
Jiaxin Liu
Mark Nie
Richard Chen
Janet Peng
Constance Wang
Razvan Preotu
Mark Plotkin
Jackie Peng
Ryan Yang
Bryant Yang
Diwen Shi
Zhanna Sametova
Shaumik Baki
Dennis Tismenko
Zi Yi (Joey) Qin
David Itkin
Juliaan Posaratnanathan
Yuekai Wang
Lin (Xin) Song
Leslie Tang
Jayson Huang